Introduction to Microsoft Visual Studio Team System 2008 Test Edition

Visual Studio Team System (Test Edition) includes a suite of testing tools that are integrated with Visual Studio 2008. This is an integrated development environment provided with Visual Studio. Test edition lets Users create, manage and execute tests and also obtain and store test results. These testing tools are integrated with the Visual Studio Team System (VSTS), so Users can publish results to a database and generate trend and historical reports. Users can also compare different kinds of data, and see how many and which bugs were found during testing. Some of the features of VSTS include:

VSTS can be used as source control system and version control system.

VSTS can be used as a bug tracking software.

By using VSTS, Admin can create work items and assign them to team members.

VSTS can be used as Design and modeling tools for development and software design.

By using VSTS, Users can setup Unit tests.

VSTS can be used to analyze code for potential problems and coding standard violations.

By using VSTS, Users can setup and create automated build process.

By using VSTS, Users can create and Run Manual tests, Web tests, and Load tests.

VSTS can be used to generate various reports to track the progress of project.

What's New in Visual Studio Team System 2008 Test Edition

Testing methods of user code

Run Unit tests faster and easily: New menu items and key combinations enable users of unit tests to select and start test runs more quickly. Users can generate tests from a binary file, without access to source code. Users also can generate tests for generic data types as return values and method parameters.

Can use Inheritance between Test Classes: Test classes can now inherit members from other test classes. This enables users to create initializations or tests in a base test class, from which all other derived tests classes will inherit. This feature helps reduce duplicated test code. This gives users more options to customize their unit tests correctly.

Can run Unit Tests on Devices: Visual Studio team system provides a set of tools for testing Microsoft Visual C#.Net and Microsoft VB.Net smart device applications. These tools provide a subset of the functionality found in the Visual Studio Team System 2008 (Test Edition).

User can create Host Adapters: Users run tests in the default environment provided by Visual Studio Team System 2008 testing tools. To run tests in a different environment, user can use a host adapter. User can use the Visual Studio Software Development Kit (SDK) to create new host adapters.

Improved Unit Test Data Binding: Users can now use a wizard to easily bind a unit test to a data source, including CSV and XML files.

Web Testing

Visual Studio Team System offers more control for authoring Web tests.

Can call a Web Test from another Web Test: User can insert a call to one Web test from another Web test. This means user can create Web test components and reuse their Web tests and Web requests.

Improved Web Test Data Binding: Visual Studio Team System 2008 (Test Edition) includes built in support for CSV and XML files. User can also preview the data before it completes the process.

Improved Web Test Features: Visual Studio Team System 2008 (Test Edition) includes support for test validation rules. User can create validation rules at the test level. These rules can apply to all individual requests in the test. User can stop any Web test if an error has occurred in the test. User also can validate the return of an expected HTTP status code. In Visual Studio Team System 2008 (Test Edition) user can extract requests from Web tests to create new Web tests. User can also insert calls to other Web tests.

Load Testing

A load test is where one or more "non-manual" tests in a test group are performed together while simulating multiple users interacting with the applications. Users can now use more realistic load modeling options for running load tests. Also, user can organize the returned data in ways that are more flexible.

Control Load Modeling: A Load test now offers some additional load modeling options, which enables users to create load tests that more accurately model the expected real-world usage of the application. User can now model usage based on the number of test runs, time spent on each test and pace at which users run the tests.

Improved Load Test Analyzer Views: The Load Test Analyzer includes a new summary view that displays the key indicators and results in a single page that you can print and export. User can view up to 4 graphs at same time. These enhancements enables user to view up to 4 tables at the same time.

Improved Load Test Results Repository Management: Visual Studio Team System 2008 (Test Edition) includes a new Repository Management dialog box which enables users to access directly the load test results repository. Now it is easy for users to open, import, export, and delete load test results.

Published Schema for XML Files: As User works with Visual Studio Team System 2008 (Test Edition), it creates and stores data in XML files. These files include the following:

Test meta data file: This type of file has the extension '.vsmdi'. Test metadata files store information about the tests in user's solution.

Test results file: This type of file has the extension '.trx'. When user run tests, VS2008 automatically saves test results to '.trx' file.

Manual tests in text format: This type of file has the extension '.mtx'. When the user creates a manual test in text format, it is saved into user's test project as a file. In VSTS, all XML files used by Test Edition are defined by a new XSD named 'TestTypes.xsd'. Any changes that the user makes to these files, manually or programmatically, must result in XML that conforms to the schema defined in this XSD. Similarly, any files that the user creates with these extensions must also conform to the schema defined in this XSD. Otherwise, the Visual Studio Team System 2008 (Test Edition) cannot use them.

Projects created in VS 2005 contain XML files. When users open VS 2005 projects, the VS 2008 test project upgrade wizard prompts user for permission to convert the files into the new format. To use the files in Visual Studio Team System 2008 (Test Edition), user must let VS 2008 convert the files. If the user decides not to convert or upgrade any files, VS 2008 cannot open project. Similarly, if users add any existing file of the previous format to any project, the user will be prompted to let VS 2008 upgrade the file format. If the user allows, then VS 2008 converts the file and makes it available as part of this project. If the user declines, then that request to add the files is canceled.

This new release of VSTS 2008 (Test Edition) provides the following benefits:

Improved Web test validation rules: Users now have more flexibility to apply validation rules and use their results to control Web test program flow.

Better control of load modeling: Users now have more flexible ways to control the load modeling in load tests that user run.